Ookami-san to Shichinin no Nakamatachi Episode 10

September 2, 2010

Something is clearly afoot from the outset as we hit episode ten of Ookami-san to Shichinin no Nakamatachi, with all of the Otogi Bank’s members called to a meeting by the club’s president. The reason for the urgency is obvious enough – somebody has been running a smear campaign against the bank, even going so far as to finding out about their secret basement “lair” and reporting it to a local paper, although the bank’s members were smart enough to deflect that particular problem.Still, this is obviously an issue, and one which the bank’s president decides to fight by offering big discounts to anyone who wants to request something, causing the Otogi Bank to be overwhelmed with requests – this means hard work for all of the club’s members, but on the other hand it gives them a lot of loans to cash in if required, as well it might be if Onigashima’s student council president Shirou Hitsujikai is anything to do with what is going on as suspected.

As the episode progresses, both Ryouko and Morino are hit with distractions from their work for the bank – in the latter case this comes from Saburou Nekomiya, a boy who promises to teach Ryoushi how to fight and protect the girl he loves, while Ryouko runs into a girl named Reiko Kokonoo who claims to have been dumped by Shirou and left to the mercy of his cronies; a story which Ryouko eats up despite it seeming rather too convenient for the tastes of even Ringo. Come the end of this instalment, the “divide and conquer” approach builds up to quite the crisis for the Otogi Bank, and more specifically Ryouko – now certainly isn’t the time for Morino to be sparring with a stranger, that’s for sure…

Throughout this series, Ookami-san has seemed to be at its best when it has a more all-encompassing storyline to focus upon, and so it proves again here – as everything begins to stack up and the plot begins to gather pace, so this episode succeeds in ramping up the tension and worry quite nicely to its inevitable cliff-hanger to lead us into the final couple of episodes of the series. If only the whole show could have focused on this bigger picture and the more interesting facets of its characters it could have been quite something; as it is, I suppose we’ll simply have to enjoy the more compelling moments as they come, but thankfully it looks like we’re at least headed in that direction as things draw towards a big finale.